


and i'll miss you in the june gloom too

by kurdoodle



Category: Day6 (Band), TWICE (Band)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-06
Updated: 2019-07-06
Packaged: 2020-06-22 09:54:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19665037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kurdoodle/pseuds/kurdoodle
Summary: Years later, Nayeon gets to start afresh - in more ways than one - and finds that sometimes asking (and answering) the tough questions are worth it.





	and i'll miss you in the june gloom too

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [stars space stars](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17268158) by [yoonbot (iverins)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/iverins/pseuds/yoonbot). 



> read that first for context. this story takes place in the years after.
> 
> not sure if this fic does the original one justice, but thank you so much for letting me expand on the story you created!
> 
> prompt: "fourth of july" by fall out boy

There are questions that are meant to be asked. Questions like - how many layers of concealer are acceptable to hide the dark circles permanently engraved under her eyes without making her look like a pasty ghost? Or: should she be worried that she hears odd noises in her new studio after 9PM? Is she just hallucinating? Or even, the million dollar question: at the end of Twice’s reign, when the industry has moved onto the next big thing, what in the world is Nayeon even left with?

She sits at the desk with packets of paper (songs, concept scribbles), almost as thick as the contract she signed with her new company after hers with JYP expired last year. Took a few months as a free agent, saw the world - this time not while on yet another concert tour - lived life a little before deciding that despite all the not-so-great nuances of being an artist, it is still what she has trained her whole life for.

There are some things to be expected: the intimidating loneliness of it all, the fear that her name would mean nothing by itself, the feeling of starting over again. But all the girls felt that to some extent. They were lucky to have more than twenty seconds of fame.

But there was one question, one factor she had not expected:

Nayeon sits at the desk with packets of paper, pen in hand, its cap in her mouth. It’s 10PM. The door swings open.

“Nayeon?” She looks up, startled. It takes a few seconds for her to register the presence of the person before her. An immense wave of deja vu comes rushing over her; it’s still that same dreadful excitement she feels, his soft smile just as disarming as it has always been.

They make eye contact. His smile widens more, and something shifts in his eyes. He’s trying to form the words on his lips. “How have you been?”

The thing about questions is that they do not always have answers.

Nayeon likes to indulge in what-ifs. It’s not that she likes them, really, but her mind goes places on auto pilot. It truly is one of her worst qualities.

In the case of Brian, he is one giant what-if in her life. A handful of years back, when Day6 had won Song of the Year for a song that he had written (about her, them, and the lack of them), she was still coming to terms with the fact that their relationship would never be the same. She remembers their careful interactions, hesitant words of congratulations, pretending in front of him that she was not affected by the story behind the song.

After the award ceremony, she was picking out confetti from her hair, pushed by the throng of artists toward the backstage area. Her other hand clung tightly onto Momo’s arm. Every award show, it’s the same sickening feeling of anticipation and apprehension, sitting for hours in a midriff-showing outfit, conscious of the camera lens on her every reaction. When his recorded singing voice echoed through the speakers, she trained her expression to stay neutral, pasting a cookie-cutter smile onto her face - but for some reason her eyes were watering as she caught his gaze.

_Do you know this song’s about you? ‘Cuz I could write the break-up song of the century and still not be over you._

She felt herself choking up. She had practiced too long at keeping it together that sometimes some of reality seeps through the cracks.

Afterward, when the cameras turned off: Sana ran to Wonpil to congratulate him, Dowoon got swarmed by the other girls, Jae almost crashed into Jihyo in his clumsiness, and Sungjin was busy greeting all the sunbaes, and Brian - she spotted Brian in the corner staring at the calluses on his fingers, bowing distractedly if anyone were to pay him any attention.

But she did. She (always) paid him attention, out of the corner of her eye, like a bad habit.

It was funny. Both their groups won something that night. Yet why did it feel like they both lost?

One what-if after another: what if they hadn’t become more than just labelmate friends, what if Nayeon had let herself simply (mistakenly) believe that Brian flirts with everyone, that she should not think of herself as special, that she should not have bared her heart in the first place? What if Nayeon wasn’t so clingy - didn’t go back on her word when she suggested for them to end things, didn’t call him back again to tell him that she was still in love with him? That was the problem, really. What if Nayeon wasn’t still in love with him?

She had written songs, too. Later on in Twice’s career, she was able to take more ownership of lyrics and even dabbled in composing for a little. It was never Song of the Year material, however, but perhaps that was all for the better. She did not need her heartbreak blasting over the speakers at every other restaurant and storefront she passed.

Once, Nayeon heard from Jeongyeon who heard from Jaebum who heard from Sungjin that Brian had been in the middle of eating kimbap when her song came on shuffle and they almost had to do the Heimlich maneuver on him as he choked down his food.

Another time, Nayeon had bumped into him in the hallway on the way to the recording studio. “Oh, hi,” she breathed. The first words she uttered to him in over a year.

“Hey,” Brian said. That smile of his. Those dang cheekbones. He brushed his bangs out of his eyes. She thinks he looks better when his hair is slicked up, but in moments like these, she still can’t help but remember a few years ago when she would run her fingers through his locks, massaging his neck and shoulders after hours of practicing his bass.

But she was not about to tell him all this. So instead of asking him how he’s been, holding a real conversation, giving her more to cling onto when really she shouldn’t be grasping onto anything at all, she quickly nodded and flashed him a fleeting smile. And left.

She couldn’t forget the look on his face.

Even after all this time, she still gets a little starstruck when she thinks of him.

Back in present day:

The clock ticks in the background, its sound somehow magnified by the deafening silence between them. Nayeon drops her pencil, which falls toward the stack of papers on the desk.

“How have you been?” Brian’s question echoes in her mind. All these years she had yearned to ask him the same. Some questions are meant to be asked, but this was one that she had always tried not to press into. Because it would be just like Nayeon to fall head over heels once more, upping their chances of winding them up in How to Avoid Dispatch 101 all over again. But maybe that’s giving herself too much credit.

Nayeon swallows. “I - “ she gestures all around her at the sparsely furnished studio. “Trying to start afresh, I suppose.” Blinks some more. “And um, it’s been a while… I did not expect to see you here so late. Or at all.”

He shrugs, hand coming up to rub the back of his neck. “Yeah, I just decided to come by and drop my stuff off. I’m guessing you didn’t hear…”

Nayeon shakes her head.

“They wanted me to help out with your tracks.” Her jaw drops. “It was a surprise for me too, believe me. I just, I just thought it would be a new experience for me, working on music with THE Im Nayeon…” She’s almost blinded by his pearly whites as he looks at her intently. “So if you’d let me, Nayeon, it’d be an honor.”

And she does not know what was in her tea that night, but somehow she has the audacity to say yes. By the time she’s done showing him where to put his equipment and giving a tour of her new company building, he’s dropping her off at her place at midnight.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Nayeonie,” are his parting words.

“See you,” she whispers back.

A question she was too scared to ask herself: did she believe in second, third, fourth chances?

When Nayeon shows up to work the next morning, Brian is already there in the studio.

“This is really weird,” Nayeon keeps saying. She’s stealing glances at him as he stares intensely at the computer monitor, engrossed in his headphones.

She can’t quite get used to the fact that they have to resort to small talk between conversations about song choices and singing technique. But through those short snippets, she remembers things about him that she finds endearing. Things like the way he scrunches his nose when he sings, how he still tries to crack jokes that more often than not tend to fall flat on the ground, how he doesn’t forget to text her when he’s running late. “You haven’t changed much,” she elbows him in the side. He elbows her back harder, which causes her to yelp, and then the rest of the day turns into a poking war that Brian lets her win.

The night of her first music video release, she finds herself dialing his number. “I’m not sure if I’m cut out for this,” she divulges.

And when he’s knocking at her door fifteen minutes later, she instantly regrets it, doesn’t want him to see her like this, in all her slobbery mess. “I’m okay actually,” she mumbles when he shows up with all her favorite snacks. He waits for her to finish sniffling to herself. “I’m okay, trust me,” she whispers again.

She doesn’t remember when he goes home, but when she wakes up, she’s in her bed with the covers drawn up under her chin.

Once, while they are sharing a beer at the company rooftop, Brian states out of the blue, “That song I wrote back then. It was about you, you know.”

Nayeon turns to him. It is strange now, how she can think back to that time and no longer have her stomach churn at the mere thought. “Yeah, I know,” is how she responds. And they leave it at that.

A month later, when Brian finds another excuse to visit her company, they are eating lunch in the cafeteria when he asks, “Does it ever get lonely?” 

Her chopsticks freeze mid-air. She purses her lips. “What do you mean?”

Brian shrugs.

“It does,” Nayeon says, shoving another pickled radish into her mouth. “They never said going solo would be easy.”

“Mm,” he replies. And they sit there in silence, eating their food, thoughts brewing in their heads but not daring to share them with each other.

Somehow, Nayeon hates the fact that all she can think about is how much she wants to hold his hand. Hates it because her mind automatically assumes the worst, that it will only lead to more heartbreak, that her budding solo career cannot afford this. When will she ever be able to afford this?

She wonders if she would ever find that answer for herself.

And then: four months later, one week before her comeback performance, she’s Facetiming with Jisoo, who takes some time out of her busy shooting schedule to catch up. “He makes me happy,” Nayeon confesses. And it’s scary, finally vocalizing it, out there for the world to hear.

Jisoo nods. “Nayeon,” she says. The static noises grow quieter and Jisoo’s blurry smile brightens up the screen. “What are you waiting for?”

When she goes backstage, sweat dripping from her lower back, she jumps a little when she swings open the waiting room door. “I’m… not sure if I expected to see you here. But somehow, I’m no longer surprised.”

His smile widens more, and something shifts in his eyes. He’s trying to form the words on his lips. “Aren’t you going to ask me what I’m doing here?” Brian teases. Nayeon scowls. “Ask me,” he insists, pushing aside the pile of clothes on the couch and patting the seat beside him.

“Fine,” Nayeon says, hands on her hips. “What are you doing here?”

He looks around and touches the empty space next to him once again. When she finally sits down beside him, he starts fanning her face and gives her a handkerchief from his pocket. Since when did he use handkerchiefs?

“Brian, what are you doing here,” Nayeon repeats.

He gestures between them, and it is only now that she notices how close their bodies are. She notices his familiar musky smell and gulps nervously. “Trying to start afresh, I suppose,” Brian breathes out.

One of her eyebrows arches upward. “Yeah?” But a smile is slowly sneaking onto her lips. It is just like him to reuse her own line on her.

“Nayeon, remember when you asked me if I would write a song about you?”

She nods.

“Would you let me write another one? About you? About us?” He shifts around in his seat. “If you’d let me, Nayeon...it’d be an honor.”

A pause. There is that familiar feeling of anticipation and apprehension. God, she loves him, loves the way he stares at her so fondly, loves how she can get lost in his eyes.

“Would you be mine again?” he finally asks.

At this, she crumples the handkerchief in her hand, sneaking a peek at her backup dancers, who are too focused on eating their food among themselves. She leans in, then, closing the space between them and pressing her lips against his. When they separate, she cannot hold back her grin. “What did you think of that?” she asks. His hand finds its way to rest on her lower back. “I’m sweaty, by the way,” she murmurs to him, batting his hand away. He shakes his head and scoots even closer.

“It’s been a really long time,” is all he says, coming close once more. Maybe this time, the timing is right and their what-if can become their reality.

She smiles into the kiss. There are some questions that are meant to be asked, even if they are belated.

Because sometimes, you might actually get an answer.


End file.
